I started doing ceramics in January this year. In my mind, after nine months I’d have finished a ton of pieces and maybe even started selling some stuff and making a name for myself as an uber talented ceramic artist. (I dream big. I always do. If not, what’s the point?) But I was wrong. Way wrong. It wasn’t as easy I thought it’d be. Far from it.

Pottery — to be really good at it — takes years of practice, of learning how to cope with disasters and frustration, learning how to observe and be patient, and sometimes of learning how to accept nature’s course.

This bowl here above, that was my first finished piece in the history of Bere. I made it on the throwing wheel, and as you can see, even the simple shapes can be challenging for a beginner (look closely and you’ll see that the things about as straight as Elton John). After it was thrown, it had to dry, and then I fired it in the kiln, and then it was ready for the glaze.

Like everything else in my mind, glazing was going to be simple — merely a matter of picking a color, splash them on, and — voilà! — my first masterpiece. The bowl was going to look awesome. It was going to have these perfectly even color stripes running along it. Man, I was so excited when it was about to come out of the kiln. Hear pumping, palms sweating of excitement. And then… complete and utter disaster. It was a train wreck. Instead of a perfectly even bowl with beautiful even color stripes, I ended up with the mess above. Once again, I had been wrong. Stupid Bere. I hid it on a shelf and didn’t want to see it again.

Then a couple of days passed, and I don’t know what happened. Maybe I just brainwashed myself or perhaps it was the case of the mother and the ugly child, but when I went back to look at it again, I suddenly found it — beautiful. It’s flaws no longer looked like flaws, now they seemed like they were there for a reason, and they actually thought me something. For example, they thought me that I have to do a better job of cleaning off all the dust before glazing (that’s why it has those bubbles), or that I in some places applied way too much glazing.

The best way to learn is to fuck up every once in a while. Sometimes I forget that and try too hard to be perfect. But that, my friends, gets you nowhere. That’s my advice to all of you: get out there and fuck up.

I can’t wait to show you my next pieces. Doing ceramics has really helped me relax and focus. I really love doing it, so much that the future I imagined for myself before no longer exists. Now let’s see where ceramics will take me. So excited.

These I days I believe the best way to show something to the world is through a gif. They are magical. I can’t stop looking at them. And if you ask me, they communicate better than a normal picture — especially the ones with just a subtle movement. They’re so hypnotic. So when I got my hands on the new Crosskix shoes I knew I had to make a couple of gifs. They look pretty cool, no?

Today one week has passed since my first marathon. For days I refused to write this post, because after all these months of dreaming and training (well…), I had reached my goal and the marathon was over. And I won’t lie — I have the marathon blues.

Everything was over too fast. Except when I was actually running the damn thing. Thought it would never end. It was so fucking hard.

Naively, and as you might remember from previous posts, I thought this little marathon thing was going to be a piece of cake. I even set a modest goal for my first ever marathon — 4 hours. No biggie. I would just keep a pace of 6 min/km. Easy. No probs. I do that kind of pace in my sleep. I’d breeze through this marathon in 4 hours like nobody’s business.

Yeah. Fucking. Right.

The WALL. I had heard other runners talking about it like some kind of mythical beast, some creature that was out there waiting to pounce you after the 25km mark. Me, I thought it was exactly that — a myth. I won’t happen to me, not as long as I gobble down my vegan (and horribly disgusting) energy gels and drink enough water and energy drinks. The WALL … pffff.

Oh. my. fucking. God. was I wrong. The WALL was real. And for me, it was a tall, mean bitch acting like I had stolen her boyfriend and now she was out to get me. Fucking hell, the bitch damn near killed me. She was so close to making me quit. But I’m not a quitter, and I fought back until I crawled over that finish line in 4:48h. Yeah, 48 minutes later than I thought, but fuck it — I completed a marathon.

Here’s the play by play

1-10k. The rain pounded down like pregnant elephants, but I still felt pretty good. I felt so good I ignored my planned starting pace. Also, thanks to the rain I had to take off my glasses which meant I couldn’t see shit. Thanks myopia.

10-20K. Still going strong. This will be easy. And who cares if I’m soaking wet. That way nobody will notice if I have to pee in my pants. Don’t worry — I would never do it. But sometimes it’s nice to know that you can. If you had to.

20k-28k. Starting to lose it. Wanted to cry like a fucking baby — I was running a marathon! And I did cry. Felt crazy tired here, but thanks to the oranges and the support from Boticapop, Angel, Héctor and Grace, I kept going.

29K. Here came the tall, mean bitch of a wall. She hit me with a hook in the gut and almost knocked me out. Never before have I been so tired and in so much pain as I was at the 29k. Now I was running through my neighborhood and I thought “fuck it”, I´m going home. But then I remembered my family was waiting for me at 35k. Damn it! Why had I made them come? At this point I had to walk a bit, and thought “why the fuck am I doing this, this doesn’t make sense. This is so stupid. Then I cried a bit, mostly because I never walk in races and I felt like a loser. “This is not you, Bere,” I told myself. So I got my shit back together and started running again, with tears still running down my cheeks.

32K. El vikingo waited for me with a big sign that said BERE. Started crying like a baby again. “I can’t do this,” I told him. “I’m too tired.” But he said, “Yes you can. I’m proud of you. You can do it. I know you can.” He was right. I could do this shit. Even if I had to fucking crawl I would cross that finish line.

35K. Had to keep my shit together for my waiting family. They gave me some more oranges, water, and after a quick hello and race update, I continued.

36k-39k. That WALL bitch caught up with me again. I really thought I was dying. I started to feel nauseous, and once again I thought — why the fuck am I doing this? I walked a little bit again and I was pissed. That bitch.

39k-42k. I remembered again why I was fucking doing this. I was running a marathon, a fucking marathon, and suddenly I felt something happening, from nowhere came this energy, fuelling my legs and mind, and I bitch slapped that WALL and got back up to 6min/k, and I started crying again because now the end was in sight and oh my God I’m about to finish a marathon and I’m ALIVE!

I’m sure you’ve noticed I haven’t posted in a while. That’s because I’ve been busy NOT running. At least not as much as I was supposed to. Instead of following my carefully thought out training program with intervals and strength training, I’ve only managed to squeeze in one long run a week. And if that wasn’t enough, I haven’t exactly been eating clean either.

Not good.

But to be honest, I did think I’d still be able to pull off a 4h marathon. Because, you know, I had run my numbers through one of those online running calculators. And according to that, 4h should definitely be within reach.

I was wrong. I learned that this weekend when I was crawling up the stairs after my weekly (painful) 30k run. Fuck was I wrong. Numbers on paper (or a screen) is one thing, number of kilometers in your legs is a whole different story. How fast you can run a 10k doesn’t mean shit in a marathon. Not if you haven’t done your miles and kilometers during the week. And definitely not if you haven’t given your body the right fuel.

I haven’t shown the marathon the proper respect, and now I will pay for it. Fuck. I will still make it, no doubt about that. But my 4 hour goal is left rotting in a trash can on Reforma.

Just finished a 21k, the first long run of my marathon training plan. Exhausted but happy.

Holy crap, I’ve run over 1000km! Considering my ass never moved beyond walking speed two years ago, I’d say it’s not too shabby. And this is just the beginning.

I promised you I’d write about my training. I was supposed to do it last week, but I was swamped with work so I never got a chance. But here goes. First I wanna say that I’m not a running expert in any way. What I know about running and training comes from googling (mostly El Vikingo’s googling, actually). So take it with a grain of salt, OK? Cool.

My plan is divided into four parts: intervals, core training, tempo runs, and long runs.

I can’t run without music. I just can’t. Hearing my own heavy breathing makes me feel tired. But when I listen to music I can forget about how exhausted I am and just focus on running. Some people (weirdos)prefer to listen to the sound of nature, saying it gives you a better experience. But in Mexico City … all you’d hear would be honking car horns and … people. Horrible. I’m posting mine and El Vikingo’s playlists here to give you inspiration. They could hardly be more different. El Vikingo prefers rock and hates most new music (he’s too damn nostalgic), and I listen to pretty much whatever makes me wanna dance. So no rock in mine.

This is El Vikingo’s Playlist. Lot’s of classic rock and even some Swedish music, and maybe even one or two modern songs. If you like to rock out when you run, this is the list for you.

Bere’s Playlist. I used this one for the Adidas Split 16. It has a good mix of hits from the 90s and the 00s. My current favorite is Bassline Junkie — it really gave me an extra boost up those damn hills. If I may say so myself, it’s way better than El Vikingo’s rock crap.

This weekend I ran the Adidas Split 16k. The race took place in Santa Fe, a little detail I had failed to notice when I signed up. If you’re not already aware of it, Santa Fe is full of hills. Long, steep, horrible hills. If I’d seen where the race was before, I’d never signed up for it. I hate hills.

The time I aimed for before I knew the race was in Santa Fe, was something in the 1:20s. After I learned where it was, I thought maybe I could still manage a 1:28. That was stupid.

When the signal went off and I started running I felt pretty good. I quickly took the back of the 1:20 pacer and thought to myself that this might still be easy — I might even set a new pb!

But then … then came kilometer 8 and the start of the damn climb. Only a few meters onto the first hill I knew I was screwed. This was not going to end well. From then on it was to hell with the clock — now it was all about survival.

The hills kept coming. Santa Fe was showing no mercy. Between 8k and 13k I said my prayers, cried a couple of times, started to understand the necessity for assisted suicide, and hoped that one day Mexico would the first country to outlaw running.

Official time, 1:34:30. Chip time, 1:33:54.

After 13k the hills finally let up, and somehow, through a miracle, I managed to push through (though I did, I’m afraid to say, walk a couple of times). In the end the clock stopped at 1:33:54, and considering the hell I went through, it could’ve been a lot worse. In fact, it’s almost four minutes faster than the 16k I ran last year!

The lesson learned: Pay closer attention to where the race takes place before you sign up. And do more hill training. Even though I hate it. It must be done.

Thought my damn calves were going to fall off.

It’s decided. I’ll buy a bulldozer and shave off every pinche hill in Santa Fe.

There’s nothing like seeing your name in print (unless it’s in a gossip magazine and your name is attached to photo of yourself gobbling down pancakes in the nude).

And guess what — last month yours truly had the awesome opportunity to write the cover story (hello!) for the travel magazine Bleu & Blanc. It was a terrifying experience. See, I’m not really a writer. I mean, not a real one. So they really took a gamble on me when they asked me to write about fashion capitals for their May issue.

But … I think it worked out well. Sure, I did bite off most of my nails (including my toe ones) and pull out half of my hair — but I got it done. And when I read it again it wasn’t half bad (if I may say so myself). You can read the story below if you want. The new issue is already out so I’d figure it’d be OK to publish the article here.

]]>http://www.tardeotemprano.net/bere-the-writer-bleu-blanc/feed/0Marathon Food: El Vikingo’s (Energy) Balls of Firehttp://www.tardeotemprano.net/marathon-food-el-vikingos-balls-of-fire/
http://www.tardeotemprano.net/marathon-food-el-vikingos-balls-of-fire/#commentsWed, 25 Jun 2014 22:22:12 +0000http://www.tardeotemprano.net/?p=19339Read more »]]>At the moment we’re experimenting with all kinds of vegan smoothies and energy bars (did I mention we’re vegan?). This recipe we made yesterday. It’s a slight adaptation of a recipe from Thrive. The only thing we changed is that we added sunflower seeds and amaranth. The amaranth was actually an afterthought, so it’s not featured in the photos.

Also, when we started we thought we were making energy BARS, but when we had run everything in the blender the mix turned out to be too soft to shape bars, so instead we rolled balls. It probably would’ve worked better if we’d stored the mix in the freezer for a couple of hours, but we were too impatient.